Let’s Not Contribute to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

I don’t know about you, but photos of the big patch of plastic and garbage floating in the ocean scares me more than almost anything else. Nearly 90% of plastic bottles are not recycled, instead taking thousands of years to decompose. If you are used to toting around your green tea, juice, or iced coffee in plastic, get a cool-looking thermos instead. This is a great choice for the environment, your wallet, and possibly your health.You can guzzle as much as you want and still be green.

Green Day

If you are able to, walk or ride your bike to school, work, or wherever you need to go. By not using your car, you are helping to reduce greenhouse gases while burning some calories at the same time! You can also use public transit or carpool with a friend-this also gives you the golden opportunity to bond with your coworkers or get to know more about your friend.

Dryers Are Energy Vampires- Clotheslines Are Better

Hang dry your wet laundry. By doing so, you’re saving energy and preserving the fit and color of your clothes!

Gaggles For Good

    Plan an outing with a group of friends that will positively impact society. Instead of just going to the movies again, gang up for the good of all. Together, plant a community garden, help clean up a schoolyard, or volunteer for a nonprofit organization. In the San Francisco Bay Area, there are regular beach clean-up efforts and it is enormously rewarding to see the unmarred beauty beneath the trash. Find your local chapter of “Heal The Bay,” and get a little sun, sand and healing for you, your friends, and your closest coast.

Tend Your Garden

    Grow your own garden, even if it is just on a stoop, window-sill, or fire escape. Fruits, vegetables, and herbs, oh my! Think of the recipe possibilities if your ingredients were right in your own backyard. Growing your own produce can save you money and time spent picking through the bruised and aged produce some grocery stores offer. This is also a great way to get organic!

Green Day

    If you are able to, walk or ride your bike to school, work, or wherever you need to go. By not using your car, you are helping to reduce greenhouse gases while burning some calories at the same time! You can also use public transit or carpool with a friend- this also gives you the golden opportunity to bond with your coworkers or get to know more about your friend.

Trees are the Lungs of Our Planet

    Have you heard about the amazingly ambitious goal of the Nature Conservatory to plant a billion trees and restore the forests of the world? From the rainforests in South America to China and even in the Arctic Circle, this hardy group of tree huggers is doing their darndest to recreate the woodlands and rainforests everywhere they can. I urge you to look at the map to see how far they are getting. It is impressive and gives me so much hope for the future.

Go Solar

    Solar ovens are inexpensive and easy to use, and you’ll cook for free every time you use one. Since it doesn’t require electricity, fossil fuels, or propane, a solar oven is perfect for your emergency supply kit. They also pasteurize water for drinking. Check out solarovens.org to see the great work this nonprofit is doing with solar ovens in developing countries. Go solar and really worship the sun.

I Love Big Bags and I Cannot Lie

    Bring reusable shopping bags when heading to the store. Whether you are grocery shopping or heading out with friends to splurge on clothes, take your own bags with you. Many stores have totes and reusable bags for a few dollars by the checkout lines that are more durable, hold more objects, and last much longer than those flimsy paper and non-biodegradable plastic bags. Reusable shopping bags help the environment by using less plastic and cutting down fewer trees.

Power Down

    Switch off lights when you leave a room, don’t leave the faucet running if you’re not actively using it, use energy-saving light bulbs, opt for blankets over turning on the heater and choose portable fans over air conditioning… All of these will lower your utility bills and help preserve the planet. It just makes cents (get it?). If every household in the United States replaced one regular light bulb with one of those new compact fluorescent bulbs, the pollution reduction would be equivalent to removing one million cars from the road.

Lessen the Landfill in Your Daily Decisions

    Diaper with a conscience. By the time a child is potty trained, a parent will have changed between 5,000 and 8,000 diapers, adding up to approximately 3.5 million tons of waste in US landfills each year. Whether you use cloth or a more environmentally friendly disposable alternative, you’re making a choice that has a gentler impact on the planet.

Save the Rainforest

    Tropical rainforests take in vast amounts of carbon dioxide (a poisonous gas which mammals exhale) and through the process of photosynthesis, convert it into clean, breathable air. In fact, the tropical rainforests are the single greatest terrestrial source of air that we breathe. What’s truly amazing, however, is that while the tropical rainforests cover just over two percent of the Earth’s land surface, they are home to two-thirds of all the living species on the planet. Additionally, nearly half the medicinal compounds we use every day come from plants endemic to the tropical rainforest. If a cure for cancer or the common cold is to be found, it’ll almost certainly come from the tropical rainforests. Tragically, the tropical rainforests are being destroyed at an alarming rate. According to Rainforest Action Network, more than an acre-and-a-half is lost every second of every day. That’s an area more than twice the size of Florida that goes up in smoke every year! According to savetherainforest.org, “If present rates of destruction continue, half our remaining rainforests will be gone by the year 2025, and by 2060 there will be no remaining rainforests remaining.”

Throwing Shade: Trees Are Good For Us

    Encourage community management of forests. If there are common property lands nearby you that are degraded, work with local communities and environmental NGO’s to establish sustainable community forestry that benefits everyone. Get involved at treesforthefuture.org and meet your fellow tree huggers!

Planet-Positive and Paperless

    Try paying bills online. By some estimates, if all households in the US paid their bills online and received electronic statements instead of paper, we’d save 18.5 million trees every year, 2.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, and 1.7 billion pounds of solid waste (50waystohelp.org).